Sure, you want your tuxdeo and accessories to draw the “He cleans up nice!” comments, but what about later that night? Do you want to peel off some man Spanx (an oxymoron, if there ever was one) and hope she doesn’t cringe, or confidently gaze into her eyes as you unbutton your shirt? Even if you’re a few pounds from your abs popping out, a good exercise routine is proven to increase your confidence by 100%. It’s science.
Cut the excuses
When given the opportunity to take action, many of us find that our reasons are just excuses — self-limiting stories we tell ourselves to stay comfortable. Ironically, that comfort-seeking slothfulness leads us to being very uncomfortable in our bodies.
Stop saying you don’t have time, access to a gym, or whatever. The equipment below is cheap, portable, and eliminates your excuses. Are you willing to put in the work, or is your plan to just gradually sulk into metabolic derangement and the comfort of a relationship that makes you avoid mirrors and loathe spontaneous pictures of yourself?
Sometimes we need a catalyst to say “enough” and kick our asses into gear. Your wedding is the perfect motivation to get fit and stay fit. Harness that motivation and turn it into something you respect.
What’s the most essential home gym equipment?
Jump Rope
Crossrope is the gold standard. They come in a variety of weights and sizes, along with an app and programs you can follow to keep you motivated and on track. I used a $3 rope from Walmart for years, and it gets the job done. Don’t expect the rope to do the work for you. That mindset is why we get out of shape. Easy come, easy go.
Fitness Bands
Elastic bands may seem about as manly as the Spanx, but don’t be fooled. They’re an excellent, low-cost weapon in your fitness arsenal, and they eliminate excuses about lack of equipment or access to a gym, whether at home or on business trips and vacations. Portability is key. Paired with a jump rope, anywhere and everywhere, you can get fitter than most of your friends without that annoying monthly bank draft from Planet Fitness.
I have a soft spot in my heart for Lifeline USA TNT resistance bands. I cut my fitness teeth on them in 2009, and have gifted them to many family members for Christmas in the years since.
Kettlebells
Kettlebells are an incredible training tool that allow you to do anything from intense HIIT (High Intensity Interval Training) intervals and circuits, to top-end strength and muscle-building hypertrophy sets, to prehab/rehab work.
Many are familiar with the dragon style kettlebells, but I much prefer the competition style because they’re a uniform size, regardless of weight. Anything under 35 pounds with a dragon style feels very unnatural for cleans, snatches, jerks, etc, so we tend to jump weight before we’ve mastered the movement. The competition style allows us to hone our technique, and when we move up in weight, the size and shape of the kettlebell doesn’t feel foreign — it moves the same.
Kettlebell Kings is my favorite kettlebell brand, and they sell both styles.
Pull-up bar
Most adults can’t do a pullup. Unfortunately, most kids can’t, either, spending a majority of their time on video games and 10 pounds overweight from a young age. I aim not to be one of those statistics. My daughter is in gymnastics and can rep them out with ease. I’ve seen boys on the playground baffled and embarrassed as this cute little thing makes them look weak. Because they are weak. It may take a while to work up to them, but how about not resigning yourself to being weaker than a little girl?
Door jam pullup bars are usually just fine for getting started, but maybe you have weak door jams, or you just want to level up, and in that case, I’d recommend a heavy-duty, wall-mounted pull-up bar. You can even shell out a little extra to go the wall-mounted weight rack route and build your home gym over time.
Also, you can hang gymnastics rings or a TRX Suspension Trainer from a rig.